Learning myths

Question 2

What are the 3 main problems with learning styles?

Answer 2

1. It’s about learning preferences, not styles.
2. There’s a big diff between learning preference and good methods of learning.
3. Splits ppl into un-evidenced groups which create huge combinations of possible styles for teaching (2 to the 72th!)

Question 3

Digital natives is …

Answer 3

BS, no evidence. Various iterations of the idea, but all lack evidence.

Question 4

Ppl can’t multi-task because

Answer 4

you can’t do multiple info processing tasks at the same time. We can do task switching, but this takes time and can be inefficient as students need to activate different cognitive schema each time.

Question 5

Google doesn’t cancel the need for knowledge because…

Answer 5

… the net is full of info, not knowledge (much of it BS). And what we’ve learned previously determines how we see, understand and interpret the read, see and understand new info - and how well we can look up, find, select and process (evaluate) internet info. Ss have minimal prior knowledge so…

Question 6

We can’t learn to solve problems by solving problems because…

Answer 6

You need domain-specific knowledge and skills to solve problems (e.g. can’t solve a chess prob, without knowing how to play chess). We often use procedural knowledge/skills (sets of poss solutions). Alternative is trial and error - and doesn’t explain WHY sol is correct.

Question 7

Discovery learning is not best way to learn cos …

Answer 7

students are not little experts/mini scientists, and have limits on their working memory. They think differently (concrete, not abstract), see world naively, and therefore experience world differently.

Question 8

Motivation doesn’t lead to learning

Answer 8

… learning leads to motivation

Question 9

Grit is BS because

Answer 9

… it’s the same as perseverance, nothing new. But no correlation tween L success and grit. But there’s a strong correlation between L and cog ability (IQ), study habits and skills.

Question 10

School kills creativity is a myth cos

Answer 10

the picture of school that accompanies it is a myth. Note that ‘creativity is largely domain specific’ - needs years of study and mastery of domain-specific cog structures and skills.

Question 11

We don’t need to make everything relevant to Ss knowledge and skills cos we can …

Answer 11

widen their horizons, introduce ideas beyond their experience, and make new and enriching connections